Early in 1916, Cumberland University’s President Homer Hill and the school’s board of trustees decided that their failing football team should be shut down to help relieve the school’s mounting financial woes. President Hill called a bright law student named George E. Allen, who was student manager of the school’s baseball and football teams, told him to notify all the schools on Cumberland’s 1916 football schedule that Cumberland was dropping football immediately. George was also told to clear out all the football uniforms and related gear from the lockers where they were stored. He did this, but forgot to notify Georgia Tech, who was scheduled to play Cumberland on Oct. 7 at Atlanta’s Grant Field.
When Georgia Tech discovered a few weeks before the game that Cumberland was not going to play them on Oct. 7, the school’s president notified Presiden Hill that, to cancel the game at this late date would require Cumberland to pay a $3,000 forfeit, money Cumberland didn’t have. Hill called George into his office and informed him of this. Both were disappointed that a rich school like Georgia Tech would hold little Cumberland to the contract.
The spring before Cumberland upset Georgia Tech in a baseball game at Cumberland which the host school won 22-0. Georgia Tech’s baseball coach, John Heisman, also the Ramblin Wreck’s football coach, was miffed when he realized that Cumberland had played four semi-pro baseball players whom George had recruited in a Nashville bar. This may have caused Heisman to influence Georgia Tech’s president to take their hard line on the football game.
Cumberland’s president decided to play the football game with Georgia Tech and hoped that nobody on his team got hurt. The problem was that Cumberland didn’t have a team. So two weeks before the game, George cobbled together a team consisting mainly of law students who had played high school football. He managed to filch some shoulder pads and helmets from Castle Heights Military Academy a half mile away and found some jerseys from the 1915 Cumberland team. He also was busy raising the $500 that it would cost to make the train trip to Atlanta and stay two nights in the new Georgia Terrace Hotel.
The brand new Cumberland football team had two or three practices where they learned four running plays and one passing play. Most of the boys agreed to play mighty Georgia Tech because they wanted to stay and party in a fancy Atlanta hotel with their girlfriends. For the most part, priorities at Cumberland were to get a good education, enjoy fraternity life, and survive playing 60 minutes of football against undefeated Georgia Tech.
On Thursday before the Saturday game, the 14 Cumberland players went to Horn Springs, a resort a few miles west of town, where there was a dance band, and a decent vocalist singing some of Al Jolson’s jazz hits. They enjoyed themselves.
When the team boarded the train at Lebanon’s tiny depot for Atlanta, each member had a suitcase and a potato sack filled with his football gear.
On arriving in Atlanta, they were greeted by a delegation from Georgia Tech who thought the Tennesseans “looked unkempt and out of sorts.” From there the team walked to the hotel, gawking at the big city. Upon arrival, their coach told them to get a good meal, turn in early and be downstairs for breakfast at 8 o’clock sharp.
On game day, Georgia Tech sent a bus to pick up the Cumberland team, some of whom had headaches after a long night of partying, having slept only a few hours.The Georgia Tech players were not hungover. Overwhelming in size and strength, they were ready to pulverize Cumbarland. In the stands were only about 75 Cumberland fans, all of whom had come down with the team.
The game was a nightmare. At the end of the first quarter, the score was 63 to 0 in the Ramblin Wreck’s favor. The Cumberland players were “battered, bruised and pooped.” The second quarter was just as bad. Tech led 126 to 0 at half. The Cumberland players seemed to have “lost their souls, stumbling through a desert.”
Before the second half, Cumberland’s coach asked the referees to reduce the 3rd and 4th quarters from 15 minutes to 12.5 minutes. The referees said OK if Georgia Tech’s coach agreed. Heisman agreed. Just before the second half kickoff, Georgia Tech coach Heisman looked down his bench. At the end was a player wearing a maroon Cumberland uniform. Heisman told the young man that he was on the wrong side of the field, The boy said he knew that but he did not want to be put in the game and begged to be allowed to stay. Heisman relented.
In the abbreviated second half, Tech scored 54 points in the third quarter and 42 in the fourth quarter, making the final score 222 to 0. Georgia Tech scored 10 touchdowns on first down and never made a first down as they always scored before that. Cumberland completed 2 passes, had six interceptions and minus 42 yards rushing. The unbelievable score made North sportswriters realize how good Georgia Tech was. They went on to an undefeated season with 7 wins and one tie with Washington & Lee in 1916 and were national champions in 1917.
The Cumberland team arrived back in Lebanon, “beat up, worn out and exhausted.” Yet, they had accomplished their mission. They had survived, saved Cumberland $3,000 and, for the first time ever, sports fans in New York, Boston and other northern cities knew that there was a Cumberland University and where it was.
The information in this article came from Sam Hatcher’s book, written in 2016, Geisman’s First Trophy.